I am 6 months pregnant, and a few days ago got a visit from my brother with an 8 week old lab pup in his arms asking if i could look after her for a few days! Some girl at his university had stupidly bought the pup, and kept her for 6 days till her landlord found out and told her to get rid or move out immediately (she's in a house share) As i am home all day my brother thought i would be ideal to look after the pup till the girl sorted out what she would do.

  Well, suprise suprise, the silly girl has decided she no longer wants pup and has told me to do what i want with it!!!!

The breeder she got her from wants nothing to do with her as she 'may have picked something up' and didn't want it passed onto the rest of the litter.
  I have asked around a few people i know, as i already have a 5 year old GR, and no one seems interested in her- what with the credit crunch.... and i hate to say it but i am falling for her!

  Her house training is going fantastically well and she is an extremely obedient well rounded little thing, and i am sorely tempted to keep her.

  Please please someone give me some advice, as there's a little voice in the back of my head telling me i have enough on my plate with my first born arriving in 3 months, but then she looks at me with those eyes....

  Help!!

Oh dear!! What a catastrophy, firstly, people like that girl need shooting!!! They get a puppy for no other reason other than its cute no doubt and dont understand the implications and time and money involved!! Makes me so mad!!

Secondly, i am glad your brother had the sense to take it to you,you obviously care a lot for animals, as does he :)

Personally, as long as you think you could cope with the pup and a baby, i would keep it!! If you could maybe manage to house train it and train it as much as possible before your due date, then that makes your life a bit easier, although seems it going very well with regards to house training anyway, i am a sucker and i know how hard it would be to let it go, even if some would say it was the right thing... so personally i would keep it, as long as neither baby nor pup got neglected and the pup was obviously kept away from such a young baby, i dont see why not :-D

BlackLily Glenys from Lab rescue should see your post and may be able to help you out.   Hang fire till she sees this or someone lets her know. 

I would strongly advise against keeping it honestly with a baby on the way.  

I would knock on the breeders door and deliver the pup into her arms, the pup is young enough to find another home, though the breeder is the pits, it is wrong that you are left now to cope with this pups future at 6 months pregnant, or better still ring breed rescue who will find the pup a really good home.

Forget for now that the puppy is giving you those eyes, all pups do that very well, imagine a full grown lab, a full on adolescent, labs are not easy pups to raise, very bouncy and full on, your priority is with your baby on it's way and your GR whom you have now, I could have a thousand pups, love them, all breeds make me go ahhhh.......  but you have to think did you want another dog at this time, no you didn't, control your emotions for a moment and ring breed rescue and get them to take the pup, they will be very careful about whom they re-home her too, and give a good home check, do the pup a favour, it's had a bad start.

Is LJS still around? Or anyone else in lab rescue to give the OP a number to call?

P.S. Your brother was not thinking of you at all when he gave you the pup, not very nice.

I have e-mail Glenys, Kath, Carolyn and Ian at Lab rescue.

If you want to call them direct yourself here are their numbers

http://www.homealabrador.net/contact.php

In 12 weeks time the pup will be 20 weeks old/5 months old and very active, in need of lots of attention and training ;)  

Have you any other children?  If not then you will have no idea of how tired you will be when the baby arrives.  This will depend on how demanding your baby is and how well you are feeling.  some babies sleep right through the night from an early age.  I have 2 children and neither of mine slept for more than a few couple of hours day or night for 2 years

What support do you have for when you are unable to give the pup the attention it demands and deserves? 

Personally I would try to rehome her now while she is young and adaptable unless you have plenty of support ;)

There are a list of breed rescue coordinators here.

I have e-mail Glenys, Kath, Carolyn and Ian at Lab rescue.


Thumbs up Blue. :-)

Act now Blacklilly, before those puppy eyes fully hypnotise you. :-)

Soon you'll have beautiful bouncy baby eyes to coo over instead.

We can help so try and make contact ,thanks Blue .

can also email me at labrador.rescue@btinternet.com

I agree with what everyone has said,you are going to have more than enough to cope with without an adolescent Labrador.Young Labs love to chew and there will be baby paraphanalia everywhere that you won't have the time or energy to be vidgilent and pick up constantly let alone the time and energy the pup and baby both need from you just to get through the day.If the breeder is no help then I should think Lab rescue will have no problems rehoming such a young puppy.Good luck with everything :)

Thank you all for the replies,

  I am pregnant with my first child, so to be honest i really have no idea of how it will be once baby is here. Although I do realise it will be very very tough. I have alot of support from my sister and her family and although they don't want a dog of their own they do walk with me and my GR almost every day for a few hours and have said they will help out.

  It's been five long years since i had a pup and i have forgotten how difficult they get at the 5-6 month stage, it DOES get alot harder doesn't it??

  I will email Glenys for advice tonight, thank you.

I was going to say 'Keep the puppy' untill I read this bit of a post...

Forget for now that the puppy is giving you those eyes, all pups do that very well, imagine a full grown lab, a full on adolescent, labs are not easy pups to raise, very bouncy and full on

And I remembered that is so true.
Labs require alot of handling and training so if your friends are willing to walk it they would also be willing to train it as well, because when your baby comes he/she will be your main priority and you will be knackered enough without a pup to clean after and ruj round after lol :)
Blimey it was hard enough for me with our 2nd dog and I didnt have children lol :)

I would have kept it if you werent pregnant but your first born will be demanding enough without a puppy needing the toilet late at night, during the night and early in the morning.

Another thing I thought of is with those moments when its taken you ages to get your baby to sleep and when you have just gottn the baby off to sleep the whining/barking/playful growling of that puppy will wake the baby up!
Its alot to take on, why not see about rescue as a pup that young will be scooped up so quick she wont even know she was in there! :)

Its still a real nice quality of you and your brother tho to take this pup in, nice one for that :)

>I would knock on the breeders door and deliver the pup into her arms

I wouldn't, I'm sure they'd welcome the chance to sell it again and get double the money for it. Labrador Rescue sounds by far the best bet - although I'm sure it's soooo tempting to keep the babe, the timing does seem dreadful for you.

M.

When I look at her now, lying at my feet, i swing to keeping her especially when I see how well she and my GR get on, but then I read a post like this Rach85 and i know what you're saying is totally true.... :-(

I had new pups with new babies and coped fine -but only with my second and third baby. With my first baby I was so shattered and so totally unprepared for it all I could hardly cope with myself. A first baby is much harder than later ones, so I'm afraid I'd have to agree as well the best bet is to go via breed rescue.

Lily Mc, I would be very loathe to return her there now too, as anyone who would sell a pup so easily to a home, so obviously wrong, and then not want her back.... :-(

  If she is to be rescued would she stay here till she goes, or would she go to another foster home, she just seems so settled here already I would be reluctant to uproot her unneccessarily.

I think whether you keep it should depend ont he type of person you are. I have three children and although we didn't get our first dog until the youngest was born, we got her when he was under a year old, and he has Downs Syndrome,s o that obviously makes things slightly more complicated than if he were 'normal' in that he was pretty much a baby for ages, and didn't walk until 3. He still cannot walk far now, aged 4 1/2 and I take all three dogs out with the pushchair. I also continued to ride and look after my horse singlehandedly until I had my children and straight after, I was even mucking out whilst in labour with the third.

However, I am the sort of person who likes to be busy and I believe that no matter how hard things were/are, I would no more likely rehome my dogs than children and will find a way to cope and ensure they are looked after properly. Because of all that, it really irritates me that people make a blanket assumption that those with babie sand young children will not cope with a puppy.

You no doubt will be tired when you have the baby, but if you have someone who can help out temporarily when needed, or even if you don't, you may well be able to cope. You already have one dog, which will still need walking and entertaining, despite being older than a puppy.

Have you thought about donating the pup to the guide dogs for the blind or dogs for deaf people, if you do you know he will get a good life.

With baby on the way you have enough to contend with, plus you've got your GR to keep exercised etc, for the sake of your sanity and the wellfare of the pup I would hot foot it to Lab rescue. My OH recently went on to Dogs Trust as they had a Goldie for adoption, when he phoned up the woman told him that she had already been taken and that GR's and Labs rarely stay there for too long. At least the pup stands a better chance with you making a decision on it's future.

As Glenys says give us a call,we can help, remember we do homechecks and vet ref potential adoptees,the number of dogs we have had in this year because of babies, and people saying "we didnt think he would grow that big"!

I hate it when someone parts with a dog because a baby is on the way. One of my pet hates but in this situation I feel it would be the right thing to do. You didnt choose to take on the pup. Its only 8 weeks so wont be to bothered about going to a new home. You are about to have your first baby and have no idea what that is going to entail. It would be better to home it know rather than when its a boysterus teenager and you find you cant cope.

i know the pup is soooooooooo cute but when baby is born can you cope with walking two dogs on leads and push a buggy at the same time, when the pup want to say hello to everybody she sees, just imagine you have two leads one dog on each side of the buggy holding the handle and pup suddenly yanks you towards an oncoming walker can you still hold the buggy without it tipping over, this is something you must consider carefully do you have a partner that will walk the pup for you when he comes home from work?
i have always had more than one dog at a time and have five children but never a pup and a new born at the same time its hard to walk two adult dogs and push a buggy let alone a pup.

Actually, just airing on the side of caution here, hopefully you have spoken to one of our lab rescue folks already, but it may be best to cover yourself legally with a letter from your brothers University colleague that the pup is not wanted and now passed onto you, I'm guessing due to the breeders response that the pup is not KC reg and has no paperwork of any sort to pass on, but even so it may be best to legally cover yourself that the pup is in your possession, sometimes people have a change of heart, initially your brother put the pup in your arms to look after only, even though you have heard verbally she no longer wants the pup, the girl may still think she can come at a later date for the pup if her circumstances change, believe me these things happen and then there are fights in court to get dogs back, so it may be best to cover yourself legally too with something in writing from her.  :-)

I am sorry I didnt see this post any help we can give  please contact me.